Writing about whatever interests me, and maybe you.

2016-02-29 training log

So I’m coming to the 3rd and final week/iteration of the LRB template. Tomorrow I start on another cutting diet cycle, so I’ll finish out this iteration then change up. More on this below.

But with that change, I wanted to establish some EDMs for the next cycle. So that’s the order of today, and each “heavy” day remaining in this cycle.

Here on day 1-A “Press, Heavy”, I’m supposed to do overheads first, but I opted to bench first. I also opted to take a little more rest between sets (2-3 minutes instead of 1 minute). I did my normal work up, but everything felt good. Tight, explosive, good leg drive. Really, everything felt so damn good today. So while I was originally going to do the programmed work up then just keep going, I opted to just adjust the singles. I figured if I could do a crisp 240, that’d be good enough for programming.

And I did that, no problem. Sure the bar speed was slow, but it wasn’t a grind. Did I have more in me? Yes. I’m sure I could have worked up to a 250-255 for a grinder, and after I got up I actually thought to myself “Man, I should (could) have gone for 2”. And I would have made it. BUT, that’s not the point of what I was trying to do. This isn’t out to establish a 1RM, it’s out to establish an EDM that I can use for the next programming cycle. 240 was solid… and doing some calculations, how I felt, etc… I do feel I got a little stronger based upon the numbers I started out with. Not huge, maybe 5#, but 5# more is 5# more. I’ll take it on this short, non-peaking, cycle.

Thing is, everything continued to move well. The BHP was programmed to be first, totally fresh, but even after benching I still hit the programming here. Granted, I took 2 minute rests, but still.

Upright rows, extensions… they were what they were. What I find cool is the 20 rep stuff. Which brings to me some assessment of this LRB template.

I don’t think the LRB template is ideal for me — at least right now. I like that I do NOT feel all that beat up, yet I still seem to be making progress, just slow progress. It’s programming that serves two masters: strength and size, and while that’s workable, you’ll never progress as fast as if you serve one master. That said, I could see using a template like this when I had no particular goals in mind other than “just keep getting bigger, just keep getting stronger”.

The template also taught me a few things, especially about higher reps. That I really need to push myself further, beyond. When my muscles and brain start to scream to stop, keep going. Maybe take 1-2 seconds to let the burn fade, but there’s still a lot of capability left in there, so keep pressing forward. When truly the muscle fails, THEN you can stop — and that point is much further along than you think. You just don’t get to this when you’re doing sub-10 reps.

I also think that while I may not normally program out to 20 reps, I think 12-20 range may be good for me. Later on in this cut cycle I will go towards more hypertrophy-oriented programming, and there I think 12-20 will do me good. But I will hit it a little different than I have been. Basically if I’m doing 5×12-20, pick a weight were first set hits 20 but second set gets maybe 18-20, and down from there — something a bit heavier. For now to get me used to and up there I’ve been doing lighter stuf and that first set doesn’t kill me: I want the first set to be hard to get 20, and downwards from there.

So what next?

Again, I start a cut cycle diet tomorrow. I’m about 212 this morning — I’m bloated after a (final) weekend of enjoying myself. Been hovering 209-212 depending how much I cheat. The goal is 190 in about 3-4 months, which should be do-able as long as I put the work in.

I’m going to finish out this LRB cycle (this week and next), then I’m going to switch to a Basebuilding model. That should be good for moderately heavy weights, higher reps, more volume — all good things for the cut, and good to start with that while I still have a reasonable food intake. The plan is to stick with that at least 6 weeks, then I’ll decide what to do next depending upon what I need to support the cut. I will stick with 3x/week for now, only going to 4x when/if I need to. I do hope to maintain strength, which should be manageable the shorter I keep the cut — the longer it goes, the more I’ll lose, which is motivation for me to bust ass and drop things quickly and steadily (2#/week would be great).